


Haunting You is Easy Because You're Hauntable

by raeldaza



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Ghosts, Haunted Houses, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-03
Updated: 2015-11-03
Packaged: 2018-04-29 17:51:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5137091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raeldaza/pseuds/raeldaza
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Feuilly has just bought a incredibly cheap derelict house, and on Halloween it becomes extremely obvious why it's so cheap when a ghost called Bahorel makes an appearance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Haunting You is Easy Because You're Hauntable

**Author's Note:**

> I don't even know. Think of it as a mad decent into seasonal writing. Also, more pre-Bahorel/Feuilly if I'm being honest.
> 
> Happy Halloween! Late!

It starts, as it should, on Halloween.

Feuilly’s walking home at dusk, arms laden with heavy paper grocery bags, smiling over their tops as children dressed as fairies and devils run past him.

The sky is quickly turning from bruise-blue into a dark black, and there’s no moon out to guide his path, only half-burnt out streetlamps cutting through the misty night, flickering as the wind blows them off their connectors. He shivers, and wishes he remembered to unpack his coat before he had wandered his way across the city trying to find a grocery store.

As he’s walking back, the closer he gets to his derelict house, the fewer trick or treaters he sees. Not that he blames them, of course – the outskirts of Paris are not known for their safety, especially his dank and morbid corner of it. Halloween has barely caught on in this area, and he doubts many kids will brave the cold autumn’s night in Murderville, France just for candy.

As he pushes open the iron gate to his house, he muses that at least he didn’t have to decorate for a haunted house; it has that aesthetic all on its own.

Feuilly makes his way into the house, and for his own sanity valiantly ignores how the doorknob fell off when he pushed in the key, and dumps his groceries on the counter.  He stares at his newly-bought Frozen lasagna, casts a look to his half-caved in stove, sighs, and grabs a box of Cheerios.

He ungracefully splays himself across his suede, once-orange couch, and flips on the television.

Night falls around the house, and the residual children go back to their homes, never having dared to approach the newly inhabited freak house on the corner. The wind’s whimper rises to a howl, and the willow tree that stands outside the broken, front window shakes, its branches flying through the air, unsettling every bird that was late for going home for winter.

Inside, the television flickers, garbling Freddy Krueger’s voice until it is near unrecognizable. Scowling, and thinking of outrageous cable bills for sub-par service, Feuilly grabs the remote off the crate he is using as a coffee table. He hits the mute button several times, but all it achieves is turning Freddy’s gibberish into a banshee-like scream. Wincing at the noise, Feuilly makes an executive decision to give up on the night, festiveness be damned, and have an early start for the next morning. Before he can even turn off the television, a loud crack resounds throughout the room, and, dumbstruck, Feuilly can only stare at the television screen, now split into several pieces.

Unnerved, Feuilly slowly rises from his seat, eyes darting across the room, before reaching forward to hit the power button on the now silent TV. Its white screen turns black, and, moving a little faster than normal, he turns, walking down the hallway to his bedroom. He forcibly ignores the flickering fluorescent lights above his head, and the moth eaten lace curtains swirling near his skull caused by windows that he was positive he had closed and locked this morning.

Feuilly is nearing the end of the hall, eager to sleep and forget about the darkened, animated house, when something appears in his peripheral vision, stilling him in terror. Heart hammering, he slowly turns, and audibly gulps, taking a step back, at the figured shadow at the opposite end of the hallway.

“Shit,” he swears, unthinking, hands unconsciously moving behind him to brace himself against the wall. The figure doesn’t move, and through his shock, Feuilly wonders briefly if it might just be a shadow of a piece of furniture that he can’t remember placing. He takes a step forward to investigate, before abruptly stopping.

“I will not be a fucking teenager in a horror movie,” he says to himself, eyes staring at the unmoving figure. Talking to himself usually calms him down, focuses his mind, and it’s proving true once again. “What would a teenage boy do in a horror movie? Investigate. So what will I not do? Investigate.”

Nodding once to himself, without averting his eyes, he moves his hands from where they are braced on the back wall towards the doorknob to his bedroom, where his cell phone is currently charging on the floor. He’ll call the police, no matter how stupid it may seem in hindsight.

As his hand tightens on the doorknob, the shadow lengths abruptly, and a powerful gust of air flies through the room, slamming the window open with a loud crack, shattering it. The previously flickering lights now illuminate to full glow, momentarily blinding him, and he has to bring his hands off the doorknob to shield his eyes from the resonating light. He quickly moves his arm from his eyes to his ears, though, because a droning beat begins to resound vociferously, seemingly coming from nowhere. Crouched up against the back wall, eyes clamped shut, hands tight on his ears, Feuilly turns his head into the wall, hoping to just outlast whatever paranormal occurrence is seemingly happening in the hundred-year-old house.

He really should have listened to his realtor and bought the apartment with rats.

Suddenly, as quickly as it started, the light and noise stop. Cautiously, Feuilly lifts his eyes to scan the area.

The lights are back to a dull, normal glow. The windows are still open, but the curtains are billowing softly. There’s nothing at the end of his hallway but his box of kitchen supplies he never unpacked. The house seemingly is back to its ancient, yet thankfully normal, appearance.

“Well,” Feuilly says to himself, looking around the completely quiet area. “Fuck this.”

He quickly begins to stride towards the front door, but an old painting Feuilly had been unable to pry off the wall suddenly comes crashing down in front of him, making a hole in the floor, stopping him abruptly. He stares at it momentarily.

“Nope,” he says, hopping over it, continuing to make his way down the hallway. “Nope, nope, nope.”

He’s fully intent on making himself a nuisance at Courfeyrac’s, as he knows the man is far too willing to take in strays, and so he completely ignores the flickering figure he sees at the end of the hallway. It won’t go away if he ignores it or anything, but he can’t really see the advantage of cowering behind his couch staring at it, either. He hurries towards the front door, grabbing the knob, and it just figures that it is completely stuck.

“Ah, fuck you,” Feuilly says to whatever supernatural entity is in his house, kicking the door. He turns towards the window, fully intent in jumping out it, when the figure flickers itself into existence, not a foot from Feuilly. Shrieking in surprise, he stumbles back into a coat rack.

It is a tall man.

His whole figure flickers, as if on a television station with bad reception. His face is pale in death, while the rest of him is unnervingly human. He slowly glides forward towards where Feuilly is transfixed and stunned into non-movement. He’s within a pace when he finally speaks.

“Leave here. Immediately. Never return.” His voice was a guttural growl, akin to the sound of rocks being pushed through a coffee grinder.

Feuilly blinks.

“Dude. You’re in scrubs,” Feuilly says with not a small bit of wonder, finally having taken in the man’s full appearance, and no longer distracted by his unexpected arrival.

The ghost doesn’t seem amused. The light above Feuilly’s head bursts, sending glass fragments flying across the room, which Feuilly studiously dodges and ignores to continue his train of thought. “They’re not even scrubs. That’s a hospital gown. That’s not menacing.”

The ghost’s unwelcome expression deepens, which Feuilly couldn’t help but note seemed somewhat at odds with his facial construction. He didn’t really know what it was about the ghost, but his face seemed like it was born to be smiling, created for laughter. His body was another matter altogether – at least 6 foot 3”, over 200 pounds, a wall of muscle, all set off by long, braided hair.

“Go,” the ghost demands, bursting the light above Feuilly’s head.

“No,” Feuilly answers. He crosses his arms, and squints at the ghost.

“Leave this place—”

“And never return, yeah, yeah, yeah,” Feuilly interrupts. “I’m getting there. But why not like, a torn shirt? Or, if you’re attached to the hospital gown, cover it in blood or something? Anything to make you actually scary?”

“Look, it’s not like I got much choice in the matter, asshole,” the ghost says, the growl evaporating and a deeply annoyed, and much higher, voice replacing it.

“Why not? The after life doesn’t have a magical wardrobe department or something? Can’t you just stop in a department store and steal something?” Feuilly asks, tilting his head.

“Like what, plaid?” the ghost scoffs, crossing his arms. Feuilly is slightly offended by the sarcasm; Feuilly loves plaid. “There’s not really a ‘ghostly attire’ magazine, you little shit. These clothes are what I died in. I can’t change them.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’m not fully corporeal. I go through things,” he explains slowly, as if talking to a child. He pushes his arm through the wall, clearly demonstrating to Feuilly why he was being moronic. “I can’t just change my appearance. What I died looking like is how I will look like forever in the afterlife.”

“That’s not really fair. You got to walk around in a poorly-closed dress for the rest of eternity?” Feuilly wrinkles his nose, looking into space a little distractedly. “That’s just not right.”

“You’re telling me. I look ridiculous,” the ghost says, sounding a little defeated. “As you so aptly pointed out, thank you.”

“Why isn’t there any blood on it? Like, if you died in surgery, shouldn’t there be blood?” Feuilly asks. He looks on in slight bewilderment as the ghost actually flushes _,_ almost taking away his pallor.

“Ah, you see, I didn’t die in surgery. I was in the hospital because I accidentally ate rat poison. It apparently killed me.” The ghost is refusing to look Feuilly in the face, suddenly completely distracted by Feuilly’s eagle coat rack he bought off ebay.

“ _Accidentally_ ate rat poison?” Feuilly cocks an eyebrow. “How did you manage that?”

“It’s not of import,” the ghost says quickly. “I’m supposed to be scaring you out of this place. Stop asking me questions.” Feuilly rolls his eyes.

“Whatever, dude. You’ve lost some of your fear factor. What’s your name, anyway?”

“Bahorel. And fuck you; I’m plenty frightening. ” Completely ignoring the latter part of the sentence, Feuilly replies,

“What kind of name is that?”

“Oh, and Feuilly’s any better?”

“How the fuck do you know my name?”

“I live here!” Bahorel throws up his hands, looking skyward, and inordinately pained. “I’ve lived here much longer than you. You really think I don’t the name of who is cohabitating my house?”

“It’s not like I’m going around speaking my name,” Feuilly counters. Absently, he notices they’re still standing in front of the door. “And I haven’t had any friends over, since this place is such a piece of shit no one wants to come by.”

“Offence taken,” Bahorel comments pleasantly.

“So, tell me, how do you know my name?”

Bahorel sighs deeply, like dealing with Feuilly is an unbearable hardship. “I read the name on your bills.”

“Oh,” Feuilly says, blinking. “That makes sense.”

“No fucking shit.”

They descend into a slightly awkward silence, both standing, arms crossed, about two feet away from each other, neither knowing how to appropriately proceed.

“Hey, do you want to come talk or watch some TV?” Feuilly breaks the silence, moving past. “I don’t think I’m going to be sleeping anytime soon.”

“Uh, okay?” Bahorel walks behind him, his pace a little unsure. When they reach the couch, Feuilly jumps and stretches himself out. Bahorel stands behind it, uncertainty tainting his expression.

“Hey, can you sit?” Feuilly asks, seeing his expression.

“Yeah. Do you want me to?” Instead of answering, Feuilly folds his legs up, leaving an empty cushion for Bahorel. He sits, looking uncomfortable. Feuilly turns on the TV with the remote, which still seems to be working, despite the cracked screen.

“I’m sorry about the TV,” Bahorel says after a moment. “That was an accident. I was trying to turn it off and on. It wasn’t working, and I got angry. Then that happened.” He flaps a hand towards the television’s cracked screen.

“Eh, don’t worry about it. It has antennas. I could probably buy a newer one at the salvation army for under twenty.”

“Yeah, this one was completely shit.”

“Excuse you,” Feuilly snaps. “I’ve had this one for over ten years.”

“Is that supposed to contradict the fact that it’s total shit?” Bahorel smirks. “I’m pretty sure that confirms it.”

“Watch yourself, Casper,” Feuilly warns. “I loved that TV.”

“And I loved mine, when I was alive. All flat screen, 60 inches of it.”

At that, Feuilly sat up abruptly.

“How long have you been haunting this place?”

Bahorel looked slightly annoyed, for some reason Feuilly couldn’t imagine. His death had to be a fairly normal thing to want to ask about. “I died about three months ago. I was thirty-one. After I died and figured out that little fact—with minimal freaking out, I may add—I was just walking around town trying to find some place to haunt. I didn’t want to haunt the hospital, because, hey, those people have enough stuff to worry about. I picked this place because it looked rather haunted. I figured a ghost might actually live here, and then I could have a roommate or something. But alas, it’s just me.”

“Why did you go straight to haunting?” Feuilly asks.

“Huh?”

“I mean, why, when you died, did you immediately want to start haunting people? Is that like, required, or in a ghost manual or something? I mean, it’s not like you’re on a revenge kick, or anything, right?”

“Uh, I don’t know.” Bahorel looks around, eyes darting, obviously caught off guard. “It just seemed like…the obvious choice. What ghosts should do. Oh fuck.” His eyes went wide, and his hands tighten on his arms. “I’m susceptible to influence from mainstream media and television culture! I could have gone around helping people, and instead, I decided to haunt, just because I’ve been told that is what ghosts do. I am part of the problem!”

His agitation makes the TV turn off again, and Feuilly can’t help but sigh.

“Relax, will you? You’re going to give yourself an ulcer.”

“No stomach,” Bahorel snaps, and stands, starting to pace.

“God, dude,” Feuilly sighs, leaning back into the couch. “Chill, will you? If you weren’t given instructions, then it would make sense that you would just default to whatever you already knew about ghosts. Which, it seems, is shit like Ghostbusters.”

“Poltergeist,” Bahorel corrects. “80s horror is better.”

“Than what, 80s comedy?” Feuilly rolls his eyes. “I’m just saying, you’re off the hook. Unless you were a paranormal investigator or mythology major or something.”

“Lawyer and law major, actually.” Bahorel scowls. “I only did that for a financially secure life – and look where that’s gotten me. Fucking hell.”

“There’s something to be said for financial security.” Feuilly gestures to the house around them. “If I had any, I wouldn’t be here.”

“And then what would I do with my days?” Bahorel sits back down, and sighs heavily. “It’s just shit. I didn’t have to haunt; I could have been helping people.”

“And how exactly would you do that?” Feuilly asks. He has a shift tomorrow at 7AM, and is already wondering what excuse he can come up with that will sound more believable than ‘I was up late talking to the ghost in my house.’ Probably, ‘a zebra broke into my front yard and was eating my gnomes’ would suffice under those terms. “You look almost corporeal, but can you actually do anything humans can?”

“Sort of,” Bahorel says, shoving his hand through the couch. A moment later, he takes it out, and then solidifies it. This time, it won’t go into the couch. “I have telekinesis when I have strong emotions, and I can solidify if I concentrate. I’m not sure the extent of it.” He looks remarkably disgruntled.

“So, what do you know? Not everyone comes back as a ghost, right, since there aren’t hundreds walking around? Or, do people just not stay forever as one, since there are no Vikings or cavemen or whatever?”

“I don’t know,” Bahorel says, over enunciating his words. “As I’ve said before, you obstinate fucker, I have no idea. I died, and then woke up like this. I haven’t found any other ghosts. It’s been incredibly dull all this time. I’ve mostly been sitting around, waiting for someone to come around to haunt. The past few months I have just been practicing my haunting.” Bahorel frowns, looking annoyed at the thought. “Other than a few passers by, you were my first person. I’m a terrible ghost.”

“Hey, no, don’t say that. I was deeply unsettled there for a while.” Feuilly, in an attempt of comfort, tries to pat him on his back, and visibly winces when his hand goes straight through him. Bahorel smiles slightly anyway, obviously appreciating the gesture.

“No, I am. When you moved in, and I was like, _finally. I am going to have a chance to prove myself._ I almost started to haunt you the moment you moved in.”

“Why did you wait?”

“I told myself it was because I was waiting for Halloween. In reality, I just…” Bahorel moves so he is facing Feuilly instead of the broken television, so his focus is undivided. “Okay, well, at first, I thought it would be fun to do really small things just to get you on edge. Move your plate from one counter to the next. Blow out a light bulb you just fixed. Open a window you just closed. That kind of stuff, you know? I thought it would be better to make you uneasy, and then slowly build to the outright haunting.”

“You sort of did that, I guess.”

“No, I did not. “ Bahorel snorts. “I kept meaning to, but then I kept feeling bad about it. You just seemed like a nice guy, you know? It seemed mean to scare you when you were just moving in. I told myself it was because then you’d immediately move out, if you hadn’t unpacked your stuff and were being haunted. But then you got all moved in, and I still wasn’t haunting you. I’m an asshole, but not so much of one that I’d scare you on your only night in. And then, yesterday, I was going to, but you looked so sad, so I didn’t want to make your night _worse.”_

“Fucking hell.” Feuilly stares at Bahorel, and wills himself not to feel fond. “You are a fucking terrible ghost. In the traditional sense, of course. Maybe you’re a great ghost friend.”

“That’s not a thing.”

“Could be.”

“This isn’t a tawdry paranormal romance novel. That’s not a thing.”

“Paranormal romance,” Feuilly repeats thoughtfully. “Can ghosts have sex? I know you can in books, but.”

“Haven’t attempted,” Bahorel shrugs, and then very obviously looks Feuilly up and down. “Wouldn’t mind trying, though.”

“Maybe later,” Feuilly shrugs. “For science.”

“Of course,” Bahorel snorts. “Science. Whatever you say, ginger.”

“Why else would it be? For your dashing good looks? Oh, honey, honey, the achromatic pallor of death really turns me on.”

“Could be my devastatingly good ghost skills, I suppose.”

“Didn’t we just establish those were non-existent?”

“I scared you tonight, didn’t I?” Bahorel says, sounding smug.

“Doesn’t make up for the other days. Those pretty much classify you as a shit ghost.”

“You’re just making shit up.”

“Well, duh. It’s not like there’s the United Nations yearly monograph on how to deal with terrible ghosts.”

“I’m only terrible if you’re comparing me with the main-stream Hollywood ideal of ghosts,” Bahorel points out. “Which is problematic at best.”

“You went through with that ideal tonight well enough, didn’t you?”

“Only tonight!” Bahorel booms. The cheerios quiver.

“Why did you choose to scare me tonight?”

“I don’t know. I guess because I sort of made Halloween a deadline for myself. I kept thinking, _you’ll do it then. That’s when you’ll embrace this non-life you have now._ I almost chickened out, but I finally just forced myself to. I gave myself an ultimatum: scare him, or move out. Enough of this half-roommate, invisible friend business. Tonight didn’t really go as I planned.”

“If it makes you feel better, I’m not that easily frightened.” Feuilly says, yawning, leaning back into the couch.

“Why not? I could kill you, you know.” Bahorel forces a gust of wind to knock over the box of Cheerios, and about fifteen of them spill out onto the floor.

“I know. You didn’t have to make a mess,” Feuilly chastises. “I’m just incredibly fucking bored, all the time. This has been a nice break from the tedium, actually.”

“You’re fucking insane.” Bahorel’s staring at Feuilly intently.

“Certifiable, probably,” Feuilly agrees. He leans back into the couch, eyes closing. “Can you leave the house?”

“I don’t know, bro,” Bahorel says thoughtfully. “Probably, yeah, since I came from the hospital. Why?”

“I have some people who would be really interested in meeting you.”

“No,” Bahorel says firmly enough that Feuilly opens his eyes. “I don’t want the government finding out about me and doing experiments and shit.”

“Who are you – Mulder? I just meant my group of friends. There’s one dude who writes slam poetry exclusively about the paranormal, and another who is a pediatric doctor with an immoveable belief in aliens. And, hell, the leader is fucking fiery as hell – I’m sure he’d find some way to find out if any other ghosts existed within a week if he set his mind to it.”

“You want me to come meet you friends?” Bahorel asks, tone so wildly different that Feuilly cracks open an eye to stare at him.

“You’ll be the highlight of their year.”

“Won’t it be weird?”

“We always needed a bouncer,” Feuilly says, settling back into the couch. “Who better than a telekinetic? Oh, God, I want to know Joly’s reaction to you.”

“Are you sure, dude?” Bahorel asks. “I don’t want to impose.”

“Yeah, I’m sure.”

“Okay,” Bahorel concedes. “I’ll do it. But only if you promise to do something for me.”

“What’s that, Patrick Swayze?”

 “You need to fix up this house. This couch is atrocious. The house looks like it hasn’t been touched in fifty years. My sister was an interior designer; she’d probably have a heart attack if she saw me living in such a space. If we’re going to be roommates, we need to make this place livable. Even if only one of us is, technically, alive.” Feuilly smiles.

“You got yourself a deal.”


End file.
